Arizona Republic from Phoenix, Arizona • Page 16

The Arizona Republic SECTION Religion Starts on BIO SATURDAY JANUARY 19, 1991 Mom sentenced to die for killing son Debra Milke joins select sorority Family, court agree slaying was heinous -trffti -iMMiiiiiii Debra Jean Mllke Says she was denied a fair trial in her case because of adverse pretrial news coverage. for the crime because the killing was especially heinous and depraved, because Milke planned to collect on a $5,000 life-insurance policy on the child and because there were insufficient factors to call for leniency. "Clearly, the victim was helpless, and the murder was senseless," Uendrix told a packed courtroom. The fact that a mother would conspire to kill her child is "shocking and repugnant to all social mores," Hcndrix read from a 16-page decision. Milke's father, Richard A.

Sadeik, opposed the death sentence but told county officials that she deserves to spend the rest of her life behind bars. "He informs that his daughter was never 'meant to be a mother' and that, if given the opportunity to have more children, she would probably continue See MOTHER, page B9 By Brent Whiting The Arizona Republic With the death sentence she received Friday, Debra Jean Milke became the third woman in Arizona history ordered to pay the supreme sacrifice for murder. Milke, 26, a brunette with doe-like eyes, joins Eva Dugan and Winnie Ruth Judd in a small but select sorority of Arizona crime figures. She was sentenced to die in the state's gas chamber nearly 61 years after Dugan, who had been convicted in the slaying of a Tucson rancher, was dropped from the gallows in a botched execution that led to a public vote that ended hanging as the legal form of execution in Arizona. And Milke received the death penalty nearly 59 years after Judd, Arizona's most infamous murderess, was condemned to die for the slaying of one of two Phoenix women whose bodies were placed in two trunks and shipped to Los Angeles on a train.

One of the bodies was cut in pieces. Unlike Dugan, Judd ended up cheating the executioner by being declared insane. She was paroled in 1971 after escaping seven times from the Arizona State Hospital, only to be recaptured each time. Judd's last escape was in 1962, shortly before the last person was executed in the gas chamber in the Arizona State Prison at Florence. He was murderer Manuel Silvas, 42, who died March 14, 1963.

Sixty-three inmates were executed in Arizona from 1910 to 1963, said Michael Arra, a state Department of Corrections spokesman. Milke, who was convicted of first-degree murder and other crimes in the execution-style slaying of her 4-year-old son, joins 94 other inmates awaiting execution, he said. Ninety of these Arizona killers are on death row at Florence, and four others are in out-of-state or federal institutions on convictions in other jurisdictions, he said. Milke, unlike her male counterparts, will not be kept on death row at Florence while awaiting the outcome of her appeals, See MILKE, pageB8 By Brent Whiting The Arizona Republic Debra Jean Milke, described by her father as a woman who probably will murder again if she has any more children, was sentenced to death Friday for the execution-style slaying of her 4-ycar-old son. Milke, 26, who made a lengthy statement claiming her innocence, showed little emotion as Judge Cheryl Ilcndrix of Maricopa County Superior Court condemned her to die in the state's gas chamber.

Ilcndrix said Milke deserved to die 1 wtzm 1 "'73'" W'i CBUJELIF Conflict offers education for Phoenix pupils iu uiddls im i HISTORY: Saddam's claim to Kuwait dates to 1914, B2 CONCERN IN ISRAEL: Hero advises restraint, B2 v. III 4 Ml By Phyllis Gillespie The Arizona Republic The Vietnam War may have been the first to come into the American living room, but the Persian Gulf war is the first to enter the grade-school classroom. "We heard our President Bush this morning on the TV," Yvonne Ieyva, a fifth-grader at Madison Park School in central Phoenix, said Friday. "He reminded the American people that this war is very complicated, and he asked for our support." Even before allied forces attacked Iraq early Thursday, Baghdad time, the 26 children in Christina Bro-kaw's fifth-grade class at Madison Park School could pinpoint the Middle East on a map. They knew about all the countries there and that oil is the chief export.

They knew that war was imminent, and they quickly learned the difference between Operation Desert 4 1 Shield and Operation Desert Storm. "With Operation Desert Shield, -they were just waiting around over there, and when Saddam Hussein didn't get out, they stormed the desert," said a boy who had waved his hand the highest when the question was posed to the class on Friday morning. Brokaw used newspapers and live television reports Thursday and Friday mornings to explain to her pupils the latest events in the Middle East. All year, however, the Middle East has been a daily classroom topic in some form. Sec Mi, page 1)2 4 If Fifth-grade teacher Christina Brokaw leads a lesson focusing on the Persian Gulf war.

Since the start of the school year, the class at Madison Park School has been studying the Middle East. Gary R. UlikThe Arizona Republic Valley Arabs resent lack of concern for their kin shown by U.S. "'ftkiL 'i E.J. MONTINI Republic Columnist to feel uncomfortable.

All over the world it is that way for us. Now, even as an American I feci that a bit." Bashar Sabagh doesn't believe that the suspicion some Americans have for some Arabs, even Arab-Americans, will change anytime soon. "Once somebody dies," he said, "automatically you get hot. That is how Americans are reacting. No matter how wrong or how right the leaders arc, when your friends get killed over there, you want to go and do something about it.

For now, it's too late for the understanding." After saying that, Bashar paused. When he began speaking again, his tone was much lighter, much brighter, as if he could not bear to end on such a sad note. Then he said, "Hopefully, understanding will come later. When the war is over, we will make some good of it." Israelis. And there are many reports about Jewish families in this country who have relatives living there.

"But, you know, there are many Arabs here as well. There are Jewish-Americans, and there are Arab-Americans. We are all Americans. Our families are all as important. But the Palestinian people do not get so much exposure.

I think that this, too, is very sad." 'A little uncomfortable' Solomon and Bashar both seem to have many friends here, people who have called them to ask if they needed anything and to ask if they had heard anything. And no stranger has expressed any hostility toward them because they are Arabs. "At the same time," Solomon said, "it feels a little uncomfortable. This is not unusual for a Palestinian. In our own homeland, we are made what has happened to our family." As for the war, he said, "It seems to me that two wrongs don't make a right.

We have for years been giving these countries weapons, and there have been wars going on for years: If I had my way, the first thing I would like is for us to stop sending weapons to that region." Bashar has heard from no one in his family for months. Since the war began, these two men have been watching television reports, like everyone else. They want the war to end soon, like everyone else. They are concerned for everyone involved, the soldiers and the innocent victims, like everyone else. But they don't believe enough concern is being shown for all the victims.

"On the television," Solomon said, "there are many reports about the are Palestinians. "In America my country now there is not much concern expressed for Arab people," he said. "But, you know, there should be. They arc in Israel, and they are in Iraq. Good people.

And they arc innocent. We should think of them as well." 'Sick to my stomach' Bashar Sabagh told me the same thing. He, too, is an American citizen living in the Valley. And he is Iraqi. Some of his family members live in Mosul, a city in northern Iraq not far from the Turkish border.

On the front page of Friday's Arizona Republic, a map showed that airports near Mosul were among the chief targets of U.S. bombers. "I have been feeling sick to my stomach since it started," Bashar said Friday afternoon. "I don't know I had just finished talking with Solomon Hawash early Friday afternoon when television reporters in Jerusalem began reporting that air-raid sirens had sounded. Israeli citizens were being urged to put on their gas masks and go into "scaled rooms" as a precaution against possible Iraqi gas attacks.

Solomon lives in Phoenix. When he last spokp to his mother and two sisters in Jerusalem, they told him they hadn't yet received gas masks from the government. That was about 10 days ago. He doesn't know if they ever got the masks. "I only know that in the last few days I have been sick and depressed," Solomon said.

"I can imagine how terrible it is for them. When there is a curfew, you know, a person can only stay in the house. There arc no distractions, so worry never leaves the mind." It doesn't leave Solomon's mind, cither. And he is not only worried about Iraqi missiles. He's also concerned about the time when people can return to the streets of Jerusalem.

"I am worried," Solomon said, "that maybe some Israeli citizens who are very angry with Iraq will take out their anger on people like my family." Solomon Hawash and his family King holiday for state is 'no dream' EVENTS MARKING KING'S BIRTHDAY Events scheduled in the Phoenix and Tucson areas to mark the birthday of the Rev. Martin Luther King born Jan. 15,1929. Now through Jan. 31, Monday through Friday, 8 a.m.

to 5 p.m.: King art exhibit, West Wing, Arizona State Capitol lobby. Today, 8 a.m. to 2:30 p.m.: Youth rally, Phoenix College auditorium, 1202 W. Thomas Road. Today, 1 p.m.: King-holiday opponents' parade and rally, Liberty Bell replica in front of the old Capitol, 1 700 W.

Washington St. Sunday, 7:30 p.m.: Candlelight service, Civic Plaza Ballroom, 225 E. Adams St. Monday, 8:30 a.m.: March from University of Arizona Mall to Reid Park, Tucson. Monday, 9 a.m.: March from Eastlake Park, 16th and Jefferson streets, to the state Capitol, 1700 W.

Washington St. Monday, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.: Festival, Wesley Bolin Plaza, 17th Avenue and Washington Street. Tuesday, 7 p.m.: Candlelight ceremony, Cady Mall at Arizona State University, fountain area. Tuesday, 8 p.m.: Martin Luther King Jr.

Tribute Concert, Odetta and Richie Havens and his band, Gammage Auditorium, ASU. Friday, 1:40 p.m.: Speech by Julian Bond, civil-rights leader, ASU Memorial Union, Pima Room. thought people didn't want a King holiday because he was black. "What could I say?" Johnson said. "I told this guy that I didn't believe that's what the vote was all about.

That surely some of the votes were cast by people with twisted motives, but by and large, I told him that people of this community, and this state, believe in the same ideals as Dr. King." Johnson touched on the slain civil-rights leader's "dream" speech and then predicted, "The state of Arizona will get this holiday. And that's no dream." See KING HOLIDAY, pagcB7 Johnson delivered the keynote address during an emotion-filled gathering that featured King's famous "I have a dream" speech, videos of King, a procession with youngsters and senior citizens carrying the flags of 40 nations and the 50 United States, and a children's choir singing We Are the World. The audience closed the event by singing We Shall Overcome. A 50- by 30-foot American flag from North Phoenix Baptist Church hung as a backdrop on the stage.

The mayor said his encounter with the little boy occurred a couple of weeks ago while Johnson was visiting a central-Phoenix school. He said the child wanted to know whether he Phoenix mayor upbeat in talk at commemoration By Don Harris The Arizona Republic A black child recently asked Phoenix Mayor Paul Johnson whether Arizona voters had rejected a paid state holiday for the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. because of the color of his skin. "That little boy, not the Super Bowl, is the reason we need this holiday," Johnson told an overflow crowd of 3,000 who attended the fifth annual King breakfast at Phoenix Civic Plaza on Friday.

The National Football League is threatening to pull the 1993 Super Bowl out of Arizona, costing the state a projected $200 million in lost revenue, because voters narrowly defeated a King-holiday ballot issue in November. "We'll get over the economic issue," Johnson said. "I'm telling you, we will. We'll have our sporting events. We'll have our conventions.

We'll get all of those back. "But what about that little boy? What about the way he thinks about himself and his future, and how he fits in among everybody else?".